Production, transportation, and handling of petroleum and its products lead to a steady contamination of oceans and drinking water sources with hydrocarbons (HC) due to minor incidents and major disasters. To date, sufficient methods for the economically efficient and – in particular – thorough remediation of these pollutants from water are missing.<br/>As a sustainable alternative to state of the art oil spill response methods, we present an HC sorbent based on magnetite nanoparticles (NP), functionalized with alkylphosphonic acids (PA). That functionalization renders the hydrophilic NP hydrophobic and oleophilic. This oleophilicity, in combination with the large specific surface area, eventuates in highly selective and efficient adsorption of HC on the NP surface. Thanks to their superparamagnetic nature, soaked NP can be extracted easily by an external magnetic field. Due to the strong grafting of the PA on metal oxides and its excellent stability, the presented sorbent can be reused after washing in multiple successive extraction cycles without degradation. Consequently, it enables for a full loop extraction process.<br/>Another major pollutant of oceans are microplastics. We found that our presented sorbent is capable to adsorb to nano- and microplastics of different size and composition dispersed in the water column. After sorption, the microplastics can be easily collected in a similar manner as the HC.<br/>Summarizing, we developed a tool to combat efficiently and selectively two of the major pollutants present in oceans nowadays.

Use of oleophilic magnetite nanoparticles as efficient sorbent for water contaminants

2019 Spring National Meeting

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